Incandescent Trial

The introduction of scientific and technological achievements into everyday practice often encountered such opposition that the advocates of the new sometimes had to use the form of the trial with prosecutors, defense attorneys and judges to prove the advantages of the new technology.

Surprisingly, the fact that through a lawsuit had to prove to the general public the seemingly obvious advantages of electric lighting.

To this end, in March 1879, the English parliament established a commission, which was supposed to put an end to the rumors and absurd rumors spread by opponents of electricity - gas companies.

The commission had significant powers: it had the right to call all the witnesses that it considered necessary, and with the same rights on which they were called by the court. The inquiry was carried out in the same way as a judicial investigation. The defendant was electricity.

Witnesses testified about his properties and actions, and stenographers recorded them. The members of the commission occupied judicial places. The table with material evidence was laden with various electrical devices, with which experiments were immediately carried out. The walls were covered with drawings and diagrams.

Professor of Chemistry L. Pleifer was elected chairman of the court. Strictly observing the court procedure, the commission “interrogated” defense witnesses - Tyndall, Thomson, Price, Siemens, Cook and others.

The arguments of the prosecution witnesses were as follows. According to artists, electric light "is cold and represents little expression." The English ladies found that he “gave some kind of stillness to his face and, in addition, made it difficult to choose clothes, since suits illuminated by electric light seemed different than in the evening light.”

Billingsset Market traders complained that "the electric light makes the fish look bad, and they asked them to remove their lighting." Many complained of pain in the eyes and blinking of light. Witnesses of the defense patiently explained that they should not look at the lights, but at the objects they lit, that look directly at the sun is even more painful, but no one blames the sunlight. That the death of the face is seen only "when mixing gas light with electric." What is the "blinking" of the arc in the lamps from poorly made electrodes. Etc. etc.

In the verdict, the commission decided that electric light came out of the field of experiments and samples, and he needed to be given the opportunity to compete with gas lighting. The commission has banned the transfer of electric lighting to gas companies, "as incompetent in matters of electrical engineering."